Dancing with The Starscrowned its Season 34 winner this past Tuesday, with the finale hitting record viewership and voting. Robert Irwin followed in his sister’s footsteps, taking home the Len Goodman Mirrorball Trophy with pro partner Witney Carson. This comes as no surprise to many fans, as the Australian nature conservationist has consistently received high scores and fan attention since Week 1. The top 3 celebrity finalists are all Gen Z celebrities (in order, Robert Irwin, Alix Earle, and Jordan Chiles), signaling to a new generation of fans DWTS has ushered in. The question is, could the show sustain this new audience enough to return to competitions twice a year?
After the major success and celebrations of this latest Dancing with the Stars season, TV Insider caught up with executive producers Conrad Green and Deena Katz to ask about potentially returning to the bi-annual schedule. While the EPs gave no confirmation on altering the show’s current format, Green did share his opinions on the proposed changes:
It’s sort of out of our hands. Being on twice a year is great for the show, but there’s a lot to be said for being on once a year. It just feels like a real event that everyone looks forward to. You don’t want to overstay your welcome.
2018 was the last time Dancing with the Stars hosted two seasons in one year, scaling back to an annual format starting with Season 28. The reasoning behind this decision was to open the spring time slot for American Idol. However, the real answer lies in the ratings dip following Bobby Bones controversial win in Season 27, where he kept advancing over others with perfect scores, even winning with the lowest score on finale night.
However, as original DWTS host Tom Bergeron pointed out, the show is hitting record ratings again, with the Season 34 finale being the most watched finale in nearly a decade. When Bergeron, who left the show after hosting for 28 seasons, returned to guest host and judge on this season’s 20th Anniversary special, he made a plea with ABC executives to bring back the results show. This would allow viewers to have a full 24 hours to digest the week’s dances, instead of the 2 hour runtime of the weekly show, which potentially shuts out West Coast viewers from watching the performances before they vote.
Ultimately, though Green still seems hesitant to mess with the current weekly structure:
Having said that, of course, we would happily embrace that challenge. As for the results show, I don’t know in the modern economics of the industry whether that makes as much sense as it used to. I do think moving the show to Tuesday nights has helped because there’s no competition from football. The social media drive of our stars, our celebrities, and our dancers has been really important in embracing the younger generation.
The show has significantly grown its younger audience in the past couple years, as its been reported that the audience demographic from 18-49 nearly doubled this season compared to last. The uptick in BTS social media content between the pros and celebrities is definitely a key contributing factor, as well as the virality of certain choreography, like Witney Carson and Danny Amendola’s leg left from Season 33.
While this is good news for DWTS, I have to agree with Green about the once a year format being good for the show’s ratings, and making it something to look forward to. But there’s another reason why I think the annual season works so well, and why going back to 2 seasons worries me.
I know it has been done before, but two seasons is a lot, and I’m talking about the pro dancers. Every season, celebrities on the show have discussed how intense training is. It yields incredible results each year, and it’s easy to forget how difficult a process each week actually is when we see the final execution during the live shows and a lot of that is on the pro dancers. I know they are all professionals, but even pros have their limits, right?
I’m curious as to whether or not execs will change things up for Dancing with the Stars by the time it returns for Season 35 amid the 2026 TV schedule. There’s certainly a lot to consider but, if anything does happen, I just hope the contestants’ well beings are considered as much as the popularity of the show. While you wait for new episodes stream them with a Disney+ subscription.
